RCMP Phone Call That Sparked Allegations of Political Interference in NS Shooting Made Public

RCMP Commissioner Brenda Lucki speaks during a news conference in Ottawa on Oct. 21, 2020. (Adrian Wyld/The Canadian Press)

The phone call that gave rise to allegations of political interference in the RCMP’s investigation of the 2020 Nova Scotia mass shootings has been released to the public.

The Mass Casualty Commission (MCC) made public on Oct. 20 recordings and transcripts of the phone call between several RCMP officials, including Commissioner Brenda Lucki and Chief Supt. Darren Campbell, wherein Lucki berates staff for failing to release details about the guns used in the shooting.

During the call on April 28, 2020, Lucki told staff she had advised the minister of public safety at the time, Bill Blair, that the details of guns used in the shooting “was going to be in the news release” and expressed her frustration that it wasn’t included.

“I was very frustrated, very disappointed, and I was feeling quite disrespected by what happened today,” she said.

Later in the call, while discussing Campbell’s discomfort with releasing the make and model of guns used in the shootings, Lucki brought up the Liberals’ pending gun legislation.

“Does anybody realize what’s going on in the world of handguns and guns right now? The fact that they’re [the government] in the middle of trying to get a legislation going, the fact that that legislation is supposed to actually help police, and the fact that the very little information I asked to be put in speaking notes at around 11:30 this morning ... could not be accommodated.”

The phone call took place about 10 days after a gunman killed 22 people around Portapique, N.S. on April 18 and April 19, 2020.

At the time, the federal government had pending gun control legislation. Shortly after the shootings, the government introduced legislation to ban 1,500 types of “assault-style” firearms.

‘Not Comfortable’

RCMP Deputy Commissioner Brian Brennan told the MCC on Sept. 9 that recordings of the phone call had been deleted.

“It doesn’t exist because Mr. Brien has deleted it from whatever phone he was using,” Brennan said.

Lucki has denied allegations of political interference in the RCMP’s investigation of the shootings, saying she was never under political pressure to release details about what guns the shooter used.

Although the recording of the phone call wasn’t made public until now, Campbell’s meeting notes, released by the MCC in June, said Lucki had made a “promise” to Blair and the Prime Minister’s Office (PMO) that details of the guns used would be released.

Campbell’s notes also said, “this was tied to pending gun control legislation.”

“The commissioner made me feel as if I was stupid,” Campbell later said while testifying before the House of Commons public safety committee on Aug. 16.

“[That] I didn’t seem to understand the importance of why this information was important to go out—the information specific to the firearms as it was related to the legislation,” he said.

During the April 28 phone call, then-RCMP Commanding Officer of Nova Scotia’s H Division, Lee Bergerman, said Campbell was “not comfortable noting the make and or models for the weapons seized” in a news release.

Dan Brien, director of media relations with the RCMP, added that his department was “under the understanding that we wouldn’t be providing” any details about the guns, but received a message from the Strategic Communications Unit shortly before posting the news release to include the weapons information.

“We got the message an hour and a little—or I guess an hour before—going into that room,” he said.

‘Chew Us Up’

Speaking to staff from the RCMP’s communications office during one of the phone calls, Lucki complained how “the little one line I needed” containing details about the firearms was not added to Campbell’s notes before a press conference.

“How did it get to me that that one line was going to be in his speaking notes and it wasn’t?” she said.

Lucki said the staff’s failure to release the information “was very saddening.”

“To watch what happened last week, to watch the media chew us up, eat us up and spit us out, and to watch, or to hear, what the [public safety] minister and the prime minister had to say about the RCMP’s inability to communicate—I will never forget it,” she said.

Lucki further expressed disappointment at “not being able to come through for the minister on the simplest of requests.”

“It’s disheartening for me to try to manage our RCMP, which is bigger than Nova Scotia, and trying to at least give the prime minister a bit of information before he hears it on the news.”

Omid Ghoreishi and Noé Chartier contributed to this report.